my pitch black house. just about everyone -- my house was out of power for eight full days. got cold the end. heck of an experience. "morning joe" starts right now. >> that's to right. he got it and the red sox win game five! >> good morning. it is tuesday, october 29th. mike barnacle, he was there last night. how do you do that, mike? midnight, 1:00, it's a phenomenon called friends. they are all in the right places. the game is another incredible game last night. incredible series. mike, i can't believe we took two out of three in st. louis.

>> amazing. st. louis is a very good club. a club that's evenly matched, glad to get out of there with two out of three. go back to fenway park wednesday night for game six. >> it's going to be electric. we're back in the series. >> i forgot for a minute in 2004 and 2007 they won the series on the road. if they can win one morton road this is the first at fenway since 1918. >> 1918, that was something. those cubbies wouldn't go away. we have in washington pulitzer prize winning columnist and associate editor of the "the washington post" and msnbc political analyst eugene robinson. senior political editor and white house correspondent for the "huffington post" sam stein answering the question that you can be called a senior in high school and senior something at the "huffington post." and julie pace and senior

investigative correspondent lisa myers who has a heck of a story that we'll be getting to in one second. sam stein, you're a sox fan too. come up to boston. barnacle just has tickets. >> distributing them like that ticket tree that gives tickets to everyone? >> all right. coming up we'll see game six in boston. let's get to the news. this affordable care act. right now it's looking like a slow motion train wreck. most of the president's defenders have gone quiet overly is a myer's investigation. it's causing shockwaves. >> lisa and her team does incredible reporting. the obama administration has officially granted a six week extension for shop towers sign up for coverage next year. they have until march 31st to do so. course correcting roll out of the obama care may be the least

of the white house's problems. for years president obama has denied the affordable care act would change health coverage for millions of americans. in fact it's been a key component of the president's sales pitch to the public. >> if you like your health care plan, you keep your health care plan. these folks need to stop scaring everybody. nobody is going to force you to leave your health care plan. i don't want government bureaucrats meddling in your health care. if your employer provides you health insurance nobody is talking about messing with that. if you're one of the 250 million americans who already have health insurance you will keep your health insurance. >> time and again president obama saying if you like your health care plan you will keep your health care plan but a new nbc news report finds just the opposite is true for many americans. lisa, you discovered the white house officials were aware that between 40 to 67% of individuals will not be able to keep their policies. tell us more. >> reporter: well, first,

willie, let me lay the ground work here. for 80%, roughly 80% of americans who get their insurance through their employers, the white house is correct. most -- they will be able to keep their insurance. there's very little in this law that impacts employer plans. the problem comes in the individual market. and that's what we're looking at. we were hearing about the people getting cancellation letters or getting letters saying that their current policy did not meet aca standards and, therefore, was going to have to be dramatically changed. in both cases those folks are not able to keep their insurance even if they wanted to. so our team went to, tried to do a little digging in to the universe of this and i went to the regulations from june of 2010, which dealt with the grandfathering issue. in it, when it comes to individual plans it says because of all the turnover you

customarily get in the individual market, that a reasonable range for the percentage of individual policies that would terminate and therefore relinquish their grandfather status is 40 to 67%. then on top of that because of the way they have defined what constitutes a current policy in a way that means if your deductible has changed significantly or whatever then you can't qualify for grandfathering, then when you add those two parts together you get to more than 40 to 67% of folks in the individual market cannot keep their policies even if they want to and the administration knew that. >> gene robinson, how does that square with the president of the united states in a state of the union address, in the state of the union address where he is selling this package saying quote, if you like your insurance policy, nobody is going to force you to leave your plan. how does he square that?

>> well, you can't really square the two. clearly, the president should have added this disclaimer that was in the regulations, that's in the law. you know, now keeping it in perspective, a vast majority, more than 90% probably, maybe 95% of all americans who have health insurance will, in fact, be able to keep the same health insurance they have. most of them have it through employers, some have it through individual plans. >> but, gene, the president was adamant. he was adamant in the state of the union of the address, he was adamant in the 2012 presidential campaign. he said some people are trying to scare you. he would point to those terrible republicans saying they are lying, they are trying to scare you and tell you that some bureaucrat is going to kick you off your policy. no. i'm here to assure you as president of the united states

if you like your plan, you get to keep your plan. not only is that not true, lisa myers reporting shows this morning he knew it wasn't true and went on saying it anyway. >> well, the president was categorical. this was in the regulation. there was some mention of this during the whole the hoo-hah over obama care. it was unnoticed by the vast majority of us. talked about the hill. we should at some point get to the question of the policy, however, and why this is the case, and it goes to the aims of obama care which are -- >> if it's a great policy -- not to cut you off, why then did the president believe he could tell the american people the truth? >> your suggesting that perhaps the public relations around the affordable care act and the

launch have not been as smooth as they possibly could be? i'm shocked you would think that. >> i would never, on my key landmark piece of leverageiation tell the american people something that was dopposed to the truth for the past five years. that's what the president of the united states has done, willie, and he's done it -- it's not like he did it, the campaign in iowa that he tossed it off. it was written in his speech, in the state of the union address. it was written in the 2012 campaign. it's been written for five years. and he says, he uses that old routine, these people telling you that you're not going to be able to keep your plan. i mean they wrote it down. like it went through. we all know, mike, how many -- how many people does the state of the union address go through? how many people have to approve a state of the union address

before it gets to the president of the united states and he read it? >> multiple numbers. and months in prea ration. uppy pace, i would like to ask you a question having to do with coverage. this story, obviously, has been about medical coverage. now the administration stems have a problem with coverage, media coverage, of the aca as it exists. you got multiple numbers of people out in the country. i don't know what the percentage is who are on the verge of thinking they will get less and have to pay more and the sticker shock of this thing is getting to be like front page above the fold every single day. how is the administration coping with this, dealing with this? >> well, look, this has been a pretty bad couple of weeks for the white house on the obama care roll out. one thing they were helped by is the shutdown. we would have had this on the front page of a lot of newspapers for a few more weeks if we didn't have the shut down.

>> the mailing list was worth it. >> white house officials say over and over again is, in the end the policy is going to work out. that may well end up being the case and if it does i think the conversation will be a lot different in a year sore. but it is a real problem when you have on the one hand these tremendous issues with the website. just over the weekend we had a whole other set of problems that hadn't been discovered until now. so you have that component of it. now they have to answer questions about whether the president was telling the truth to the american people. those are not things you want to deal with at this stage. they rather talk about policy, talk about enrollment numbers. this is not the roll out they imagined. >> willie, you got the website and then the "l.a. times" article that brings over the weekend, sticker shot, working americans getting cancellation notices and sticker shock aspect. that's terrible politically for

him and terrible for working class americans and now lisa's component the third component of the story which is the president, if the report is correct and i know it is, the president has been telling things to the american people that he and his administration are not true. it's three bad strikes against him. >> be careful about saying this is a tiny sliver of people. it's 14 million americans who get their insurance coverage individually. that's not an instant number. lisa, the white house yesterday, jay carney effectively said yes there are some plans that don't meet the minimum standard of the affordable care act. that is, in fact, true. they would say though our plan allows you to get benefits. yes maybe your premium goes up, your deductible goes up but you have more benefits including for mental health. what did the white house tell you >> they basically made the same point. they said look anyone who is losing their insurance is losing their insurance because it doesn't meet our standards.

and that this new policy will give people more protection, they can't be dropped because they get sick, they by and large will have a richer package of benefits. the problem is a lot of the folks we talked to who have received these notices first were shocked that they got them because they thought the president had told them they wouldn't but also they didn't like the government telling them what they had to buy. and they in some cases were very happy with the more bear bones policy that they thought met their needs, and cost them less. now there was one individual who actually found another policy where the premium was lower than what he had. he thought it was a good plan. you want he was still irate he received this letter and he had to go shopping for a new plan. >> sam stein, has the white house tried to justify to you, sam, since you are the senior whatever you are -- your mom

will kill me when i meet her. has anybody tried to justify? because they can try to talk about the policy right now but they are not going to get to talk about the policies and first explain why the president misled the american people for five years. has anybody tried explain a way to you how this happened? you know, sort of the way the administration tried to explain away george bush's 13 or 14 words in the state of the union in 2002 -- >> 16 words. >> 16 words. look at you. middle school and he still remembers it. >> i retain that stuff back to my bar mitzvah days. they tried to justify it but it doesn't ring true. it's based on technicality. they said we didn't change the insurance policies the in surers changed the insurance policy. then you made them of course have a certain amount of benefits in their policies that they are offering. let's concede that the white house did mislead when it said that you can keep the policy

that you have. there are important things to note here which is one, ten essential services that are now covered. so i think barnacle is a little bit off when you're paying more for less. you're paying more for more. then the other thing that's a problem here the website is not up. while people will be forced to buy new plans or at least survey new plans it's tough to do that when you don't have the website to survey those new plans. the average tax subsidy you can get to buy this type of insurance is about $2700 which can offset some of this increased cost. that might lessen the blow to some people except they don't know that because they can't get to the website that tells them this is the savings they are allowed to have. there's a whole host of problems compounding one another for the administration. this can change over time but at this moment you have the sense that, you know, this is just one great mess that administration has to figure out a way to deal with. >> encourage everyone to read

lisa's report. she and her team put together a lot of news. another big story not only allies upset over the agency's wiretapping, senator diane feinstein is calling for a full review of the mass data collection at home and abroad. the california democrat who chairs the senate intelligence committee said she's opposed to spying on u.s. allies. according to senator feinstein congress has not been adequately kept in the loop. feinstein said the administration assured her surveillance would not continue. a point some officials later challenged. while the president may be poised to order a ban on eavesdropping on friendly leaders still unclear what the white house knew and when. the agency said it did not inform the president of reported monitoring of german chancellor angela merkel. the "l.a. times" citing current and former officials said the white house and state department both signed off on it. >> mike, you're taken back to

the days of iran/contra. i'm not comparing these scandals to iran/contra, but we keep having to ask ourselves the question -- is the president really in the dark the way everybody around claims that he's in the dark about these huge issues? if he is, is that worse than if he had known about it? this was written in the "the washington post" today, for a smart man president obama professes to know very little about what's going on in his administration. on sunday night the "wall street journal report"ed he did learn this summer the nsa was bugging phones of german chancellor angela merkel and other world leaders for nearly five years. followed by a few claims of hhs sebelius obama didn't know about problems of the health care website before the launch. the white house frequently has given a variation on this theme.

the question, what did obama know and when did he know it? answer not much and about a minute ago. i mean not much and about a minute ago. and so now we're hearing that from other people that he did know for five years that angela merkel and allies have been -- i mean this is bad. >> the length of time that the program has been under operation or at least the lent of time it has been published with various world leaders. if he did not know, if you choose to believe the president of the united states and i believe the president of the united states, i want to believe the president of the united states. >> some reports suggest he signed off on it. >> if he did not know why didn't he know? the larger question is do we have an out of control national security agency? do we have a secret government in the shadows of government that the president of the united states and elected official doesn't know about.

>> so we are feeding from the south of france. hear groaning. so, mika, thank you so much for showing up and you just pop right in. god knows we need somebody defending me this morning given all the things going on. >> okay. couple of things. stwargt the bush administration so i guess you could ask if president bush knew too and put those questions to him as well. >> what started in the bush administration. >> this monitoring of phone calls. >> of foreign leaders. >> if i may -- oh, wait dew point me to talk. i can go back to the south of france. >> i want you to educate what report suggests that george w. bush tapped the phones of world leaders? >> when did this start? >> four or five years ago. >> 2002. >> 2002. >> the tapping of foreign

leaders. >> yes. so you have to apply the same questions to president bush, first of all, whether they do or do not know. i think barnacle brought up the biggest point and that is the nsa overreaching in its power, is this something people want done but they don't want to hear about it. you got to look at that part of it too because we can apply this to a couple of different issues that we complained about or argued about on our set about the conduct of the bush administration. but i would say that most importantly, the important disconnect that i think is happening in this story is that people are thinking that like someone is sitting there listening to her conversations. the phone calls are being monitored. that's different than tapping the phone. >> this is gene. i did write about it this morning. >> i was reading that. >> that the nsa is out of control. >> yes. >> some of us do think the nsa is out of control and some of us

think that -- you know, it's an interesting question, though. we don't know all about what the president knew and when he knew it and -- but it is certainly outrageous to me that the nsa would think it could, like tap the phone of, monitor the phone of the german chancellor without telling anybody. >> gene, since you wrote on this. help me out. is there evidence that george w. bush had the nsa tap the phones of our top allies in germany or france or is there evidence of that? >> reports in my newspaper and other newspapers from the reporters who are well sourced in this say that this program of like, you know, snoop on your friends started in 2002. it's been going on for some

time. we haven't delved was it different in the bush years than the obama years. was the nsa, indeed, doing this without letting people know? and that's a big question to me. >> one of the things we were talking about is how remarkable it would be that edward snowden might have known about this and barack obama didn't. then the other thing that strikes me is, you know, obviously i under that these programs are very controversial but the amount of controversy over this program is a little bit higher it seems than when we found out they were collecting bulk data on regular citizens. diane feinstein the chairman of the senate intelligence committee is outraged over this disclosure but fine with the other ones. >> what's worse to express, mike barnacle, that i think it's many world leaders that have this happen to them not just angela merkel and i wonder if that should have come out or if that creates more of a firestorm. but, again, it's not george w. bush sitting there with his head

phones on listening to angela merkel's conversations, or president obama, it's very different. mike? >> but, mike, if the president knows, if he's getting this intel and if these reports are right that the white house and the state department signed off on it he knows without sitting there with his head phones on that we're tapping phones. >> i'm sure knees at some level the depth of this program. but probably not the entire depth of the program. but one thing that's missing in this conversation that we're having, that others are having, that's in the newspapers, is the level of anxiety, fear, apprehension, alertness that existed on september 12th, 2001, still exists today. and the world is, indeed, a dangerous place. joe, you have spoken to people in the intelligence committee. we've all spoken to people on the intelligence committee who will tell the threat level that

the president receives in his overnight presidential daily briefings and other officials receive is horrific. horrific. >> i've been saying it. one of our biggest battles on this show is what we have to do to keep this world safe. i guess the only thing i would say in 2013, we are in 2013, right? >> yeah. i still get it wrong on chats. >> a couple more months. i'm still in 1978. >> what are you doing writing checks. you're not in the wrong year, you're in the wrong era. >> mika is the woman at the grocery store. >> you got me. >> not going through. >> ma'am, we don't accept checks. >> listen, the world is a dangerous place. this is one more example of how barack obama and his supporters suggested that george w. bush

and dick cheney shredded the constitution and hated civil liberties and worst thing that ever happened and you couldn't walk around the upper west side without people selling postcards of him as adolf hitler. >> i didn't do that. >> i told you before he got elected he was going to do all of this because all of my friends in the intel community said the second he gets elected he'll amp it up and he's done exactly that. this is stunning how he's taken whether it's the drone policy or the nsa, how he's taken the bush/cheney policies and turned it up. >> in this case it's the bush/cheney policies continuing. >> he's amped up some of the nsa scrutiny, he's amped up the drone program. no question about that, joe. he stopped torture and closed the secret cia. >> there's that. >> there's a lot bush and cheney did -- >> he stopped a water boarding

>> he stopped water boarding. >> under bush's policy and under that program three people were water boarded. and they stopped water boarding in 2005. so thank god he got elected. the world loves us so much more today. you guys were all right. if we could only get barack obama in the white house we would once again be loved by the people of luxemborg. it's almost like kennedy is president. you can walk through ireland and feel the love of the people. when we walk through cork, we see people who loves the president. not somebody who shreds the constitution. maybe he accidentally dropped drones on us. and taps mom's phone. >> joe, stop.

>> we love america. you people are jokes. you people are all jokes. this is what you got. you got a drone dropping phone tapping president. >> mika, come home. come home. we all knew it was a crock of crap. it was. the world doesn't love us more. good lord. >> somebody give him a blanket to hug. all right coming up on -- >> coming up on "morning joe" senator chuck schumer will join us if he isn't watching right now. also "hardball" chris matthews.

we'll talk to columnist charles kraut hammer about his new book. and later, mr. october, our conversation with hall of famer reggie jackson. up next the top stories in the politico playbook but first bill karins with a check on forecast. bill? >> good morning, mika. joe at his best. one year ago today was when hurricane sand die was going onshore in southern jersey and this storm, obviously, left its mark on the worst we've ever seen in this country. i want to explain briefly why it was so bad and could it happen genotype scenarios. as far as the storm there wasn't a storm so bad a category 1 hurricane. one of the largest storms we've ever seen in the atlantic basin let alone one coming on shore in the highly populated areas of new jersey and the storm track was unprecedented. usually these storms go up to the bahamas and out to sea.

but than left turn. 50 billion, about second all time. as far as today's weather, there's some bad storms in the middle of the country. kansas city, minneapolis. next couple of days severe weather outbreak is possible in st. louis to dallas-ft. worth. east coast the fine. middle of the country is where your travel trouble will be today right through halloween. you're watching "morning joe" on this wednesday. i started part-time, now i'm a manager.n. my employer matches my charitable giving. really. i get bonuses even working part-time. where i work, over 400 people are promoted every day. healthcare starting under $40 a month. i got education benefits. i work at walmart. i'm a pharmacist.

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increasingly getting liposuction to lose weight to help pass the body fat test. fitness experts argue the test isn't accurate and are urging the defense department to change requirements. the number of soldiers discharged for being overweight is ten times higher than it was five years ago. >> so what do you think? if we're in the marines and we probably instead of running 20 miles just going to go to the doc. >> we're well past marine condition, i'm afraid, joe. >> if we wanted to. i want liposuction. >> less than a week after five people were hurt on ride at the north carolina state fair another person was hurt. a work certificate in critical condition after the second vortex ride fell on him. i don't let my children go on these ride. three to five people hurt in the

first vortex accident. one of the victims is 14 years old. these carnivals are set up and go from town to town. do you let your kids get on those rides? like i wouldn't go on the tea cups. >> i went on the tea cup at hershey park and i'll never ever go on a ride again. no. >> what is the vortex? >> the vortex, it's where it spins out around -- >> no. why? why? we like to find other things to do like push ups. >> eat kale chips and read shakespeare while other kids are having fun. >> i make them run up hills. who can get up to the top first. >> kale chips. >> eating kale chips. >> corn maze. we do the corn maze. yeah. all right, "l.a. times," toyota

failed "consumer reports" reliability ratings. the toyota camry and prius were removed from failing frontal crash tests. this year three nonjapanese brands the audi, volvo and gmc were in the top ten. >> "san francisco chronicle" mysterious barge housing four stories of shipping containers exploding in san francisco. experts speculate it can be a floating data center. another possibility is a marketing center for google glass. either way that's kind of creepy, willie. >> totally creepy. >> don't fully under the story. >> they have a barge in the water and making google stuff in there. >> a difference between the east coast and west coast. you see a floating barge out

there you figure it's a tech center. you see something off of long island you figure it's just garbage, right? >> often it is. >> often it is. and trying to figure out a place to dump it. so, speaking of -- >> creepy. >> creepy. >> wow. >> i would say creepy. >> how is your son, he's so cute. >> my son is fantastic. >> like him. >> we don't put him on that want tea cup either. but we don't let him eat kale chips. >> are you the president or ceo of something or other? >> i don't know what. >> north virginia roady club, the elks club. >> i can feel the power sitting one person away from him. >> virginia's governor's race appears to be in the hands of

the democrat, terry acall live. "the washington post" poll showing him up on ken cuccinelli the republican attorney general there 51-39, libertarian candidate polling at 8%. there's a big gap among women. mcauliffe leads cuccinelli by 24 points and i under the president will be going into virginia this weekend, jim. >> if i were the president that's what i would do. we're up by 12. no chance that democrats wouldn't win this seat. i would go in there and help claim part of the victory. mcauliffe is nervous. you want help from groups that helped obama. there's no mystery in the outcome. inside the white house worried that the clintons are getting the attention for spending so much time on this race in the state, building up their political operation and will they get the credit for the victory? partially. at the end of the day this was a

superior candidate in an environment that very much favored democrats. >> jim, let me ask enthusiast, from outside of virginia not following the race close lui it makes no sense to me a libertarian candidate who run against cuccinelli whose conservative policies are pretty good. he was less than diplomatic in his book taking on social security, medicare, doing a lot of things saying man that's not smart if you want to get elected in america. yet a libertarian is pulling eight points from him. if the libertarian isn't in the race it would be much close center >> it would be much closer. cuccinelli has had baggage since the beginning on scandal coverage that had an effect on this race. >> why do the libertarians feel a candidate against one of the most conservative guys you can find in virginia.

>> welcome to the republican party. that's the debate we've been having on capitol hill in most cases someone is never conservative enough and there's a difference between the libertarian strain of conservatism right now and even the conservative strain of the conservatism right now. and i think you're going to see that split certainly in 2016. you'll see it pop up in almost every sing race fun look at the collection of people who are thinking of running in 2016, you're going to have conservative, scott brown who might run, he's forming a p.a.c. up in new hampshire. i don't think there's a place for scott brown in the modern republican party at least outside of new hampshire. so, it's an interesting test case for republicans in virginia but at the end of the day this is a big moment for terry mcauliffe the fact that he's being taken seriously. he's always been this fundraiser but a gap between people taking

him as a serious policy guy, a serious politician and just a friend of the clintons that can raise a lot of coin. >> jim, thank you. coming up red sox says jon lester pitched a gem in game five of the world series last night. moving closer to a world series title. highlights of game five next. i'm a careful investor. when you do what i do, you think about risk. i don't like the ups and downs of the market, but i can't just sit on my cash. i want to be prepared for the long haul. ishares minimum volatility etfs. investments designed for a smoother ride. find out why 9 out of 10 large professional investors choose ishares for their etfs. ishares by blackrock. call 1-800-ishares for a prospectus, which includes investment objectives, risks, charges and expenses. read and consider it carefully before investing. risk includes possible loss of principal. it's not the "juggle a bunch of rotating categories" card. it's not the "sign up for rewards each quarter" card.

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♪ a strikeout ends the inning. get another 2-2 to molina. here's a 1-2. wainwright strikes out. inside corner to strike him out. it's a 1-2. caught him looking. here's a 2-2. a strikeout. 2-2 pitch. six in a row. strikeout number seven. >> johnny lester dealing last night. cardinals and red sox game five. david ortiz started things off hitting .733 in this series, a double off adam wainwright, gives the sox an early lead. fourth inning matt holliday gets the cards on the board, hits a bomb off lester. that tied the game at 1-1. big knock of the game game in

the seventh and it was david ross up with two men out. rips one down the left field line bounces into the seat for a double. sox take a 2-1. take another run to go up 3-1 with the gem from lester he went seven and two thirds with seven strikeouts. the red sox take the 3-1 victory now on the brink of a title game six in boston wednesday. the kid will start for the cardinals the red sox have yet to announce their secretary of state. who do you think we'll see? >> probably jon lackey. >> good. >> "morning joe" at fenway thursday morning. all the kids are invited. come on out. so fixes let's talk about st. louis for a second. they have had a great team. you were there for three days. great team, phenomenal ballpark and the fans, there aren't any better fans. >> one of the greatest fan bases in baseball. it coalesces around so many

states and been there for so many years. the fans are magnificent. the ballpark is magnificent. the city is clean, open, friendly. great italian section of st. louis. the hill, yogi berra went up there. we went there tote. >> great ball team, great organization. how many times have we seen the 3-2 series blow up. >> cardinals were down 2-3 two years ago and game back and won the last two games. >> and the rangers are still hurting. what do you think? >> you know, after this weekend, after the way those two games ended saturday and sunday, one on the interference call, the other one, i don't know what will happen. >> st. louis seems one bat short of winning. >> they are pretty close. it will be lose. game six tomorrow night up at

fenway. coming up next here national review ramesh ponnuru for the must read opinion pages. don't go away. we'll be back with more "morning joe". could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. ramesh ponnuru

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had to show for their trouble was a symbolic vote on defunding and a clean cr. they were back where they had started only with lower poll numbers and more poisonous divisions. if someone had missed the intervening week they would have had no idea of the drama and political pain that had ensued before the party accept ad version of the initial unacceptable compromise. from one point of view the entire episode was all rather pointless. from another it was quite important. it was the latest and most consequential expression of an apocalyptic conservative. >> this is one of the most important articles i've read in the national review in a very long time. how did we get here as a party? >> well, i think that for a long time a lot of conservatives have led themselves to believe that the major reason why conservatives haven't been doing better in politics is that they are just not ideologically committed enough, they have been

too compromising. if you take this sort of false idea to its logical conclusion it's a recipe for endless confrontation because you always got to prove you're pure enough. >> of course, you had in iowa this past weekend at the republican event out in iowa, you had the evangelical pastors saying we needed more republicans willing to be crucified in the public square for their views. i don't know. back when i was running, i thought the idea was to get more votes than the other side. >> that's right. but, you know, one of the disturbing strands of conservative thought that went into the shutdown is that electoral politics have failed conservatism and therefore we need to try to get our way through sheer will power and that's what a lot of the shutdown was about. when you talk to people sometimes and debate these issues and you say we got to win

elections they will say well, you know, we tried that. it's not working. that's a pipe dream. which is a really -- it's a dispairing thought. >> further define apocalyptic conservatism, if you could. i think it points to the heart of the problem. >> the idea that we're trying to get out rich lowry and i, this is a conception of politics where politics is not about persuasion and winning elections it's about confrontation, it's about will power and purity. >> do you feel this is a conversation that the republican party has been having at least since mitt romney lost the election last year perhaps before. do you feel the impact of the shutdown, the low poll numbers that we're seeing is this actually something that will impact the direction of the party? will it be forgotten in three or four weeks? >> it depends on what lessons people take from it. that's why we wrote this article because we wanted people to take the right lesson from it.

it's certainly possible for people to conclude well we just should have been purer. it's never -- it's always self-confirming. >> where does it? i'm genuinely concerned about the republican party. >> come on, gene. you don't have to lie for us. come on. >> i didn't say -- >> next you'll be telling us if we want to keep our insurance we can keep our insurance. >> no. i did not say i love the republican party. i said many times and have written that i think a strong two party system is a good thing. >> i can tell you that ramesh and i and rich and the rest of the guys are thankful for your concern for the conservative cause. mike barnacle. i love eugene. >> ramesh, you talked about lessons learned and ideological purity.

have there been any lessons learned in this quest for ideological purity over the fact that striving for the government shutdown in order to prove i'm more pure than you are as a conservative or whatever that you missed the, the conservatives missed a huge opportunity to build up their numbers by instead having just stressed the flaws in the affordable care act rather than going towards shutting down the government? >> think that was a missed opportunity, but that's an issue where republicans are being saved from themselves by just how bad the obama care roll out has been. because ultimately, you know, people's cancelled health insurance plans that's just a fact that's going to -- >> not cancelled, upgraded. >> no, no cancelled. >> we should be saying you're welcome. >> ramesh, thank you very much. come back. good to have you on. we'll be looking for the new

issue of the national review. >> look at that cover. is that not -- i'm going to frame that cover. i love that cover. this really is, mika, this is one of the more important conservative articles in at that long, long time and ramesh would love to have you come back later this week and talk about this if you can. >> i don't agree. >> gene doesn't come to work on barry goldwater's birthday. >> he wishes we were more like goldwater republicans. >> you got to go back to that. >> we'll be right back. ♪ [ male announcer ] staying warm and dry has never been our priority. our priority is, was and always will be serving you, the american people. so we improved priority mail flat rate to give you a more reliable way to ship. now with tracking up to eleven scans, specified delivery dates, and free insurance up to $50 all for the same low rate. [ woman ] we are the united states postal service.

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>> up next, did she cut her hair? yes nor. taking a poll. michael steele joins us. also "hardball's" chris matthews. oh, god. okay. oh, lord. don't want to see that. news political director chuck todd, "morning joe" back in a moment. ♪ [ jen garner ] what skincare brand is so effective... so trusted... so clinically proven dermatologists recommend it twice as much as any other brand? neutrogena®. recommended by dermatologists 2 times more

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>> if you like your health care plan, your keep your health care plan. these folks need to stop scaring everybody. nobody is going to force you to leave your health care plan. i don't want government bureaucrats meddling in your health care. if your employer provides you health insurance on the job, nobody is talking about messing with that. if you're one of the more than 250 million americans who already have health insurance, you will keep your health insurance. welcome back to "morning joe." we have a lot going on here in washington. first of all, the associated press julie pace is still with us and joe i'm telling her she needs to pick up the pace on her wedding plans and we'll work on a hair cut.

>> i can just say for julie, julie mind your own business. >> you like the advice. >> i'm soaking it all in. >> also -- wait where did sam go? he went to go study his notes. he said he would be here. willie, mike barn cal in new york and joining us here at the table in washington, we have -- >> eight people. when sam comes back we can play softball. >> okay. >> can we do match game or something? >> all right. we have the host of msnbc's "hardball," chris matthew, the author of "tip and the gipper." and chief white house correspondent and host of daily run down, chuck todd and msnbc political analyst and former chairman of the republican national committee michael steele. >> we have a lot to talk about. chris matthews, the president has been hit with a one, two,

three regarding the affordable care act, one the website that we've been talking about for a long time. number two the "l.a. times" article talking about the sticker shock effect which actually will have more of an impact probably in the long run and thirdly, lisa myer's report talking about those assurances the president talked about people getting insurance not ended up being true at the end. the white house seems to be in a position they need to get out in front of all of these stories. how do they do it? >> we they mosted on november 30th numbers the end date of the fun and games, the opposite of fun and games. i think there will be some push back on those issues of inshurd people who were assured they wouldn't get a rate hike. there were a lot of people in that list has catastrophic. catastrophic covers a limited list of challenges. it doesn't cover the normal medical experience of an average person so they are much cheaper

like the person that bill crystal was alluding to. no wonder it doesn't qualify. he kept offering it as an example of an average person basically being double crossed by the president. i think it's a real challenge if people with regular policies out there that cover normal medical expenses are now told wait a minute that policy doesn't count. i think that will be a real problem for the president in terms much his credibility. >> let's talk, chris, also, you get it. you talk to your brother and his friends in central pennsylvania. we're not talking about how this is going to play in, you know, my old district, very republican district, or in ted cruz's texas. in central pennsylvania where mika's in-laws are, you know, and your brother and our family in pennsylvania, people in swing areas they don't want the government telling them you can't keep your insurance

policy, and hey the president told me i can keep this. what's going on. >> especially states heavily insured. i got a list the other day. i pulled it together of the states where mostly people are insured thanks to governor kasich. to say this the people of pennsylvania are pretty responsible they have health care. a high percentage do. those people are self-reliant republican or democrat they don't want to be involved. this is for people who don't have health insurance. that was the whole sales pitch for health care for working people going to who 40, 50 hours a week and they don't have it. it was for them. supposed to exempt and hold harmless everyone else. that was the idea. that's not the case it's not fair. >> chuck todd the sticker shock story out of l.a., in the "l.a. times." that's more damning to this administration and supporters of aca than the website. that's an embarrassment.

you stack that with the president's assurances not being true. this is a problem for the white house. what do they do? >> they put themselves in the hands of the insurance companies. they were making promises that they were hoping the insurance companies were going to keep. but when you think about that initial statement and at the time all of us said we're highly skeptical of how he can make that promise because let's look -- let's look at our own company. we can't decide to keep our health care if comcast decides to change health plans. okay. we can't. we'll get a choice. we'll get a, maybe an a or b or c. so when the president said it, he was basically only people on medicare or medicaid. >> the bigger part of the story is damaging part is lisa myers is reporting that the president

was saying things that he knew. >> i never understood why he said if you like your health care plan you can keep it because he was relying somehow on the insurance companies to keep this promise. >> lisa myers reported that he knew that he was not telling the truth. and he said it at the state of the union address, he said it in 2012, based on the nbc news investigation the president knew he was telling deliberate untruths. and how do they get around that? >> well, i don't know how they get around this but i go back to this other, this other issue, is they put their fate in the hands of the insurance companies. let's talk about the sticker shock. okay. so the administration passes a law that says you have to have a baseline. did they not think the insurance companies weren't going to raise their premiums to cover the new -- >> or upgrade. >> that's what's going on.

you have these people getting letters, some people are referring to them as cancellation letters. they are not cancellation letters. but they are being told hey guess what? your insurance does not qualify to these new standards, so you're going to pay more to meet these new standards. again, this goes to making promises you couldn't keep and goes even worse, lisa's report which says they knew this wasn't going to be case for a large grouch people. >> michael steele, the white house's one take although the law allows people to stay in the plan that they had when the law was passed with no changes, this is called the grandfather's plan, the grandfathered plan many insurance companies and they are putting it on the insurance companies have upgraded their plans to improve the quality of coverage. it's not like they are losing their plan but getting a letter saying you have to change it because we're upgrading and there might be an upgrade in the price. >> it goes back to what nancy

pelosi said in 2010, let's pass the law before we know what's in it. now we're beginning to see what's in the law. the fact of the matter is as chuck noted getting in bed with the insurance company based on assumptions that where you now having the government enter into the marketplace and trying to define the new floor and the new ceiling allege the new corners and rooms that consumers are going to be in, well the market has its own ideas of what those floors and ceilings and what that room should look like and that's what you're seeing being played out here. now the consumer is sitting here getting these letters. i look at my own personal, you know, insurance premiums going up the way they've gone up and i know that this ripple effect out there in addition to finding out oh, now if i go into the exchange i'm going to get probably a lo moly premium but more than the deductible will kill me because that has to come out of pocket for 4,000, 6,000, 8,000, $12,000.

>> insurance companies are taking advantage. >> of course they are. >> did the administration not know the insurance companies would do this. they did it with medicare part d. you can't write legislation and hope the insurance companies are going to -- they wrote leverage jays basically let the insurance companies write this legislation. >> exactly. >> the insurance company wrote this legislation, medicare part d and everybody screamed and this is what happens when you let the insurance companies do it. >> i just want to ask the question, a lot of people were led to believe to be kidding themselves about what their policies cover. let's find out more beyond these investigations were these policies complete policies. wait a minute this policy doesn't cover all that stuff. >> raised the floor. >> raise it to reasonable standards to what an insurance program should cover. catastrophic plans are not health care plans they are catastrophic plans. you buy them because you are

healthy and young and you ride motorcycles. that's not a health care plan. if the government comes along let me tell you what a hearth plan is, it may be a reasonable standard before we jump to the conclusion that somebody screwed somebody. >> willie geist, jump in. >> julie, the white house is arguing as it reads lisa myers report yes in some case, in a small number of cases there are plans out there, people with individual insurance who are not covered by their employers their plans don't meet the minimum standards. yes we'll change your plan and you'll pay some more money maybe a higher deductible or premium but we'll provide more lth care. we're helping you out. we're broadening your coverage. you have to pay more. >> that's the problem. they never said that three years ago when they were debating this law. that goes the issue hered the w to get this law passed, what did they say to try to sell to it

consumers. and what's the actual reality it going snob you could argue it's good policy to take people who are on catastrophic plans, who are on plans that have very low levels of coverage and put them on better plans, improve their coverage. but if these people didn't know this was happening is that good policy to essentially be dishonest to the american people? >> okay. i'm going to jump to another story because there's new developments surrounding the nsa. while president obama may be poised to order a ban on eavesdropping on friendly leaders, monitoring, it's still unclear what exactly the white house knew and when. the president is increasingly facing accusations from all sides of being a mere on looker in his own white house. republicans are calling president obama the quote, bystander president. a memo on the rnc's website point out numerous examples of a president who appears to be left in the dark. >> i heard on the news about

this story that fast and furious, where allegedly guns were being run into mexico. >> do you know when he first knew that there was a problem? >> well, i think it became clear fairly early on, the first couple of days -- >> so not before that, though? not before october 1st? >> no. >> when did you first learn that the irs was targeting conservative political groups? >> i first learned about it from the same news reports that most people learned about this. >> when did the president find out about the department of justice subpoenas for the associated press? >> yesterday. let me be clear. we don't have any independent knowledge of that. he found out about the news reports yesterday on the road. >> i certainly did not know anything about the ig report before the ig report was leaked through press. >> question about so len dra. has the president been briefed about what has developed on that

>> i'm not aware that he's been briefed. >> there's some reasons why that's not fair but we can start picking them apart. not just republicans who are calling the president's level of engagement into question. in a new column for "the washington post," dana mill ganks writes in part this. for a smart man president obama professes to know very little about a great number of things going on in his administration. question what did obama know and when did he know it? answer not much and about a minute ago. chris matthews, first of all it's not the first administration to have a front person saying the president wasn't aware of this a, b or c at this point or trying to insulate the president as they figure out the entire scope of the story. having said that this nsa report about angela merkel and other leaders and monitoring the phone conversations, it's kind of a strange thing for the

republicans to pin their argument on since it started under the bush administration. did he know? >> i want to say something good about diane feinstein. the grown up in the group which is always her once again showed her head and said this should have never happened. this san ally. this is simple decency. smart politicians want to know everything. i worked for tip. every single morning he grilled three of us. what do you hear. what do you hear. anything i ought to know. anything special? he grilled us like a vacuum cleaner. doesn't the president do that to his people? isn't it their job to tell him every single thing he's heard about whether somebody is whispering at the coffee machine, anything that may be of help to him in running this country. why didn't they read the local papers at home. they need to know to cover their backs. >> do i think you can draw a distinction between southeast issues we saw in those clips things like what was happening with the irs, fast and furious. you can understand why those

issues may not have percolated. when you're talking about things like spying on close u.s. allies and when you're talk about problems with the roll out of your signature legislation, it seems as though those issues should have made their way into the oval office. >> let me ask chris matthews. what if the speaker's office had the power to tap foreign leaders phones and tip o'neill came into you and said you did what matthews or what if tip o'neill found out that the ap reporters and fox news reporters had had their phone records seized and he wasn't made aware of it. i mean it just -- it boggles the imagination. like you said, strong leaders want to know, and either this president is extraordinarily disengaged or his people are

extraordinarily disingenuous. is there any other way to look at that,lis? >> he used to do things like how many staff showers in this room. you did this too. he didn't say it. how much we got, couple hundred,000 bucks. how come you didn't tell me. the only time he got mad at us when something went wrong. they were trying to put another leadership team together. bill gray from philly said it's going on and i didn't believe him and it was going on. that's when he found out about this kabal against him. he dealt with it. by the way, the first phone called made as president to angela merkel, didn't somebody say we listen to everything she says. you want an update. or did somebody not tell him that information. who decided not to tell him that

they were tapping her phone in his first conversation because we know what was going on in her private life. >> it is tapping? hold on. >> i'm sorry, isn't it? >> yeah. >> yes. chuck todd -- >> what else do you call it? >> they monitor. >> they monitor who she's talking to. so that's not a tapping per se, but -- >> what happened? >> okay. >> okay? >> chuck todd, a bigger picture -- hold on a second, guys. >> no, big difference to listening to the conversation. >> yeah. >> chuck, no, not really. not really. >> i don't think she thinks that's a big difference. >> chuck, you've been covering this white house for some time. >> it goes to the -- joe i know where you're going. >> this is -- i nene president going oh, gee i just wlaernd the rest of you guys that the irs -- wait i just learned with the rest of you guys that ap

reporters phone records have been seized. oh, i just learned with the rest of you guys, kathleen sebelius, he just learned with the rest of america of the problems with the website. chuck, what's going on? there's one or two answers. >> this is the senior leadership instinct which is always to put up this wall and essentially because they believe if they somehow say the president knew any little thing then that opens up, that create as feeding frenzy and opens up a new can much worms. their instinct is to immediately say boy we're just learning of this to buy time. >> the president is either telling truth or not. >> it's their standard -- i look at it it's their standard buy time. it's their way of calling a time-out and trying do this. i this over time it does make the president look detached and look as if, you know, and the thing is he's pretty engaged. he's very engaged. idea that he didn't know some of these things --

>> mike barnacle -- >> he argues on the health care thing there's historical revisionist going on people throwing up red flags were not throwing up red flags they were throwing up oh, by the way but doing i want as a side not having the guts to say how bad something might be. i think there's some truth to that. >> chris, let me ask you, harken back to tip o'neill. many years ago i can remember tip telling me that one of the things that he found out that helped him the most in his conduct of the speaker's office was something that kenney o'donnell who was close to president kennedy in the white house told him. he told tip o'neill that his, o'donnell's most important job, most important job was to tell the president of the united states the bad news first. which leads to my question to you about the supposed insularity of this obama white house staff, have been with him, a very small circle, close

people for many years. very few people coming in from the outside to give him perhaps the bad news, perhaps the good news but anyway the insularity of white house staff? >> i think -- look i don't want to go back to my old saw. you need a strong chief of staff you can hire and fire. you need clear accountability. it's the president of the united states most important job in the country. i want must to be done with perfection. when there's imperfection somebody ought to get slammed. that's the rigor you need. no floaters. nobody having unclear job descriptions. floating around. nothing is more dangerous than that. nobody should be in the white house working there or allow good in there unless they are hierarchy. remember president nixon was critiquing iran/contra and he said reagan should say he doesn't know anything about it. i couldn't do that.

this president has an i kwimmpi. he doesn't have a chief executive struck your. he's not just the professor in charge, the foreign policy guy he's the chief executive of the united states government responsible for the irs and all the agencies under him. maybe you consider that conceptual but it's real an every time something gets screwed up out there there's a sense he may not be involved. that's not way it ought to be. we only get one guy in there and that's the chief executive and he ought to be accountable. >> chris matthews thank you so much. we'll see you tonight at 7:00 on "hardball." julie pace thank you as well. i hope you put up with me. chuck and michael steele stay with us if you can. up next superstorm sandy one year later. we revisit one of the hardest hit areas. plus senator chuck schumer on what's still need in the recovery efforts. in the coming addition joe will

be taking part in a series of events to mark the upcoming publication of his brand new book "the right path." it's the right time for this book. it scares me, actually. things kick off on monday november 11th at columbia university the miller theater there. he'll sit down with jon meacham. you can get free admission by emailing your name and he mail address at seejoe @nbcuni.com. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. i started part-time, now i'm a manager.n. my employer matches my charitable giving. really.

i get bonuses even working part-time. where i work, over 400 people are promoted every day. healthcare starting under $40 a month. i got education benefits. i work at walmart. i'm a pharmacist. sales associate. i manage produce. i work in logistics. there's more to walmart than you think. vo: opportunity. that's the real walmart. as your life changes, fidelity is there for your personal economy, helping you readjust along the way, refocus as careers change and kids head off to college, and revisit your investments as retirement gets closer. wherever you are today, fidelity's guidance can help you fine-tune your personal economy. start today with a free one-on-one review of your retirement plan.

♪ a week after the storm the

first real look at sea bright, new jersey and how destructive sandy's storm surge was to this town. you see this flash and get a sense how high the water was. inside a rush of emotion as they survey the damage to their three generation home that is now uninhabitable. >> this is danny. he's safe. that's all that matters. >> just south, before and after pictures reveal how powerful sandy. now where the iconic bridge once stood a dam is being built. >> it's not real. it shouldn't be real. >> that was one week after superstorm sandy last year. year later some things getting back to normal but a lot of it is not. nbc news is back in sea bright, new jersey for us this morning. >> reporter: we got here just a couple of days after the storm and this area was completely ransacked.

we were able to produce some of the live pictures out of sea bright and what we saw in this entire business district is every single one of these businesses were all blown out. it looked like it was ransacked. when the storm hit to give you and idea what sea bright is like, it's three blocks wide. the ocean is right back here behind us. and if we swing back towards where the businesses are, three blocks behind me now is the river. so when sandy hit the water came in and clapd together and put this town completely under water. people looking at the town from the bridge up there said sea bright is completely under water. they were right. eight feet of water, sea water that was rushing through this area. every single business was destroyed. all of the residents were evacuated and kept out for weeks. about 1400 people that weren't allowed to get back in. right now the mayor of this town said 70% of the residents have been able to move back. 30% or 400 or so families are

still not able to come home. it's unclear when they will be able to. they are saying there's a lot of insurance issues, a lot of issues getting aid as you're seeing up and down the jersey shore. some of the businesses are back. there's a re-opening for this one on the corner. for the most part there's still a long way to go. that's what you're seeing up and down this area. >> sea bright, new jersey, a lot of work to do. let's bring in new york senior senator chuck schumer. senator schumer, good to see you this morning. let's pick up where katie left off. there's a lot of money to help homeowners and business owners. the problem is it hasn't gotten there yet. a year later what's taken so long? >> a couple of things. the first year was one of recovery. just clearing all the debris, finding people a place to live, tens of thousands of people lost their homes. and setting up the structure to prepare for the second year. while the first year was one of recovery the second will be

rebuilding. the spigot is now open and the money should start flowing. why did it take a hil? congress took a long time. secondly we wanted to learn from the mistakes of katrina. in katrina a lot of money was spent where it shouldn't be. you saw those trailers sitting there. than lot of money wasn't spent because it didn't get to the homeowners, the small businesses, the communities where we needed it. we tried to learn from katrina's mistakes. and i think you're going to find in this second year that homeowners will be made whole. there's enough money just about for every homeowner whose home was damaged to rebuild their homes, same for small businesses and communities and in addition we've added mitigation money. so when people rebuild their homes, when communities rebuild their roads, there will be far more protect. homes will be elevated. roads -- there will be dow jones and other barrier that prevent storms from coming. so it's taken too long and too many people have had to wait. but i think the second year is going to be a very, very

goodyear. one other reason it took a long time, sorry to go on. sandy, the sandy money is flexible. we designed a new program. if you have insurance we didn't want to pay over the insurance. so you had to first settle your insurance claim and if that was 40,000 and you had 100,000 of damage you could apply for the 60,000. >> senator on another topic, joe and i were eavesdropping on one of your conversations last night. you know i'm kidding. here's the question. is the nsa out of control? >> well, look, i think that it needs to be more transparent. look, there are two sides to this. on one hand they have protect us and the fact that there hasn't been major terrorist incidents in the united states is no accident and it's in good part because of the work of the nsa. on the other hand, an agency that has such awesome power should not be so opaque and ideas like making the fisa court proceedings public, ideas like

having an advocate on the other side when the fisa court has argued bills that both senators have make a lot of sense. i think we can find a balance. there's some on the right who say let it do anything. there's some on the left say abolish it. both are wrong. i think we'll come to a happy median in congress. >> and you're happy the giants are only two games out? >> they are going to the super bowl. >> that's good. >> sadly they are still in that division. back to the question mike asked you, were you surprised to learn this week that president obama had no idea that chancellor merkel was being eaves dropped on, one of our closest allies. did that surprise you that information didn't reach the oval office? >> from my own experience what intelligence agencies tell you and what intelligence agencies don't is a very and i'm not on the intelligence committee but

it's a thing that's hard to discern. so i would have to know internally more the workings of the white house to say he should have known or he did know or whatever else. you know, look, i don't begrudge a president -- it's such a hard job. president obama is one of the most prepared presidents i've ever met. when i come in to meetings with him on any subject he knows the issues very well. so i think it's a little soon to and would be wrong to just put blame at his feet. on the other hand, the issue of eavesdropping, it's really unseemly to do this whether it's phone tap, listening into conversations or anything else. and unless the intelligence authorities can show that americans were really made safe by this kind of eavesdropping and i don't think they can, it ought to end right now. >> senator chuck schumer of new york joining us on the one year anniversary of sandy. coming up still ahead, 14 time all-star reggie jackson, one of the great world series

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i've never heard this in the history of "morning joe." >> what's that

>> sam stein is leaving. he has to go. he has a plumber coming. >> it's true. i'm embarrassed to admit it. it's true. >> what does that actually mean? what's that code for? >> no, no code. >> you have a plumber coming. >> there's no code. >> i wish my sister congratulations. she just gave birth. i'm an uncle now. >> that's no reason to leave even though she had the baby six hours ago. the plumber? go. >> stop at a home depot and get a plunger. >> thanks, barnacle. >> did your sister work for obama too? >> oh, stop it. >> all right. thank you, guys. >> all right. >> all right. up next -- pulitzer prize

winning columnist charles krauthammer joins the discussion. his new book traces three decades of influences that shaped his political philosophy. we'll be right back.

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democrat enered before the introduction of microchips. >> it was written on the stone tablet by the hand of god. >> and i was there. joining us now from washington, pulitzer prize winning columnist for "the washington post," charles krauthammer. he's out now with a new book "things that matter three decades of passions, past times and politics." mr. krauthammer it's great to have you on the show. i'm read sewing much about you. something i didn't know about you. former democrat. practiced psychiatry and practiced medicine for three years in the psychiatric residence of massachusetts general hospital. these things that we're learning about you today along with your incredible record academic record as well. in your book, you write in part this. i'm often asked how do you go from walter mondale to fox news.

to which the short answer is i was young once. the long answer begins by noting that this is hardly a novel passage. the path is well trodden most famously by ronald reagan himself once a new deal democrat and more recently by a generation of neo-conservatives led by irving cistol and norman podhoretz. every story has its i die 0 is in extra sis. these are mine. >> i heard you weren't going to write about politics in this book and then decided you couldn't avoid the subject it was too integral to not only who you were but who we are as a nation. >> that's the theme of the book. i really wanted to write about the fun stuff the elegant and beautiful stuff in the world.

the beauty of a perfectly thrown assist. and the guy who said don't touch my junk became an american hero. there's a lot of writing about physics and space but in the end, and i intended to do a book entirely on that, in the end i realized that you can't do that because all these things, all the beautiful and elegant things, in the end depend on getting the politics right. you can have the most flourishing of cultures. you get the politics wrong and you got germany 1933. you get china during the cultural revolution. or if you don't want to look back historically you get today. north korea where they get the politics wrong. it's a mad kind of stalinism. and what you have in the land is he did so allocation, spiritual and material. i decided i would do a book where part of it was on the lovely things in life the

elevated things in life and the other would be the writings i have done on politics, because in the end politics is the mode, it's the wall. i write this in the introduction which keeps away the barbarians and not just the foreign one, the internal ones, the barbarism inside. >> your life was shaped by some things but one person that had a huge impact on your life was your brother who you lost in 2006 to a bout of cancer. and he was doctor. talk about how he shaped your life. >> i write about him. it's the first column in the book. when he died, at the grave site i talked about him. and the reason that he was so influential is we were the only two siblings. he was four years older. and unlike most older brothers, he took me under his wing, he didn't sort of exclude me. he always included me in his

circle. so when i think back on the friends of my childhood, the friends that i had were actually his. so he taught me to play with the big boys at a very early age and that's, that toughens you up for life. >> mike barnacle. >> charles, talk a bit about your own personal evolution and the people you covered, the people you write about from around cambridge street and mass general wearing your scoop jackson button in 1976 to meeting in the oval office with the president of the united states a couple of weeks ago in an off the record conversation. you have seen and written about a lot of dopes in politics but a lot of people who were truly, truly bright. this president is particularly bright and yet his administration seems to be somewhat flawed. what we're talking about today, the health care act, the nsa stuff, the president not knowing.

talk about this president and what you think he brings to the office in terms of his intellect? >> well, one of the reasons i decided to wait all these years to collect my columns is i didn't think there was enough history. well right now it stretches all the way back to the first day i started in journalism which was the day that ronald reagan was sworn iannetta his first term. there's this 30 year arc from the presidents identify known. agree, and this arc goes through 30 years, the end of the cold war, the '90s, which i call the holiday from history, 9/11, the age of terror, bringing us up to this remarkable president today. and what i find the most remarkable about him isn't only his tels but his ideological position. he said something very interesting in 2008. he said ronald reagan was

historically consequential in a way that a clinton was not. and what obama meant was reagan changed the ideological trajectory of a country, which for 60 years since fdr had been dominated by a liberal zeitgeist. here comes reagan and he changes it. he doesn't succeed in all the things he wants to do, isn't able to cut the government, but changes the way we look at government. obama has always seen himself -- and it is remarkable because he did this as an outsider, somebody who really had a long shot at the white house, but he saw himself long ago as world historical, as a figure who would change that trajectory and the 30-year conservative ascendancy ushered in by reagan and begin a new liberal ascendan ascendancy. the irony is that his signature achievement, obama care, is the test of this new liberalism, and today it hangs in the balance.

a website or a promise here and there. so there's kind of a practical reality check on his ambitions. if he does not succeed with obama care, the cause of the kind of expansive liberalism, the kind of entitlement state he's been looking for i think will be set back a full generation. >> so, charles, just to prove how consistent ideologically "the washington post" editorial page, our next question will be coming from gene robinson. gene. by the way, i've got to say this. >> perfect. >> i'm sorry. i read your columns and i know the next day gene is going to copy them almost word for word. it's embarrass, gene. >> joe, just for the record, there are at least one or two issues, and i have written columns -- we should write a joint column about drones at some point. >> yes. >> we agree on them. >> pulitzer prize winners lined up here. go ahead. >> charles, first of all, congratulations on the book. >> thank you. >> i'm really excited to read

it. it was fascinating what you said about president obama. i wonder if you could talk about the country just for a second and this sort of polarization. you know, a pet theory of mine is that what we're seeing as a result of some of the anxieties that people are feeling about economic and social dislocations that are taking place in the country, these big forces that are beyond our control, is do you buy into a theory kind of like that? i'm sure you have kind of a krauthammer take on the larger trajectory of this country. so what is it? >> gene and i are the yin and yang of the op-ed page of "the washington post." if you want yin, you read me, if you want yang, you read the next day. a great question. i do think the reason we are polarized, the reason whef this ideological division is because -- and i write about this in the book talking act the new constitutionalism of the right. we are in a crisis of the

welfare state. it was constructed half a century ago. and the demographics and the technology of our age are completely different. and there's a sense in the country that we have to radically change that. we cannot sustain what we have constructed. and there's a party on the right that says you've got to radically reform, and there's a party on the left, as you hear nancy pelosi and others say, i don't want to -- you know, i will not tolerate a single reduction in social security. and that i think is the reason why we are polar itzed. we cannot split the differences very much longer. we're going to have to make a decision whether to go right or left, reconstruct the welfare state or expand it as liberals are arguing. and that's why i think you've got such divisions left and right. one other reason which i write about in the book is that there's an axiom in politics,

conservatives think that liberals are dumb, but liberals think that conservatives are evil, which makes for a lot of interesting interpretations. of course i don't include you, gene, in that category. >> nor would i include you, charles. >> yeah. i'm not evil and you're not dumb. but it sort of explains the attitude, you know. liberals look at people as sort of well meaning and all that, so we pat them on the head. we conservatives, we pat them on the head about their evolutions about the world. liberals actually think conservatives enjoy throwing orphans into the snow. so it's a little problem getting our ideas across. >> i actually had this conversation with a lot of friends who are liberals, silting around the table, and they went on for about 30 minutes how evil republicans are and they want to throw -- after about 30 minute, i said, hey, guys, i'm right here. yeah, but you know. you don't believe that.

you don't believe it. i said, well, no, actually i do. they just had this horrible shocked look on their face. charles, it's a great honor to have you here. >> thank you, charles. >> i make no secret of it. i think you ear the most important voice in conservativism, and such an important writer. and you prove that so, so clearly during the government shutdown and holding our own to account. >> and in this book. >> i appreciate everything. and the book, "things that matter: three deck ailds of passions, pastimes, and politics," read it. you'll be glad you did. thanks, charles. >> thank you very much. pleasure to be here. >> you can read an excerpt on our website, mojo.com. we'll be right back. for the times you need to double-check the temperature on the thermometer, be ready. for high fever, nothing works faster or lasts longer. be ready with children's motrin.

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he's got it and the red sox win game five. >> good morning it is. tuesday, october 29th. mike barnicle just -- barnacle was there last night. how do you do that, mike? >> that game ended around midnight. >> midnight, 1:00. a phenomenon called friends. another incredible game last

night, incredible series. i can't believe we took 2 out of 3 in st. louis, mike. >> it's amazing. st. louis is a very good club. the clubs are evenly matched. glad to get out of there with 2 out of 3, go back to fenway park wednesday night for game six and see what happens because i don't think anyone can predict what will happen. >> it's going to be electric. a heck of a series. >> i forgot for a minute last night that in 2004 and 2007 they won the world series on the road. so this actually, if they can win one more game, would be the first at fenway since 1918. >> it would be the second time that i was there. >> boy, 1918. that was something. those cubbies just wouldn't go away. >> wouldn't quit. >> we also have in washington pliltser prize-winning columnist and associate editor of "the washington post," also msnbc political analyst eugene robinson, senior political editor and white house correspondent for "the huffington post," stam stein, answering the question that can be called a senior in high school and be a senior something at "the huffington post."

also white house correspondent for the associated press, jill pace, and nbc news senior investigative correspondent lisa myers, who has a heck of a story that we'll be getting to in one second. but sam stein, you're a sox fan, too. come up to boston. barnicle has tickets. he just throws them -- >> like a ticket tree that gives tickets to everyone? i'll take some. >> coming up, we'll see game six in boston. >> all right. >> where i willie, let's get to the news. this affordable care act, right now it's looking like a slow-motion train wreck. most of the president's defenders have gone quiet over lisa myers' investigation. it's causing real shock waves. >> lisa and her team have done some incredible reporting. because of the issues surrounding the website healthcare.gov, the obama administration has officially granted a six-week extension for shoppers to sign up for coverage next year. they now have until march 31st

to do so. but courts correcting the rollout of obama care may be the least of the white house's problems. for years president obama has denied the affordable care act would change health coverage for millions of americans. in fact, it's been a key component of the president's sales pitch to the public. >> if you like your health care plan, you keep your health care plan. these folks need to stop scaring everybody. nobody's going to force you to leave your health care plan. i don't mean to government bureaucrats meddling in your health care. if your employer provilds you health insurance on the job, nobody is talking act messing with that. if you're one of the more than 250 million americans who already have health insurance, you will keep your health insurance. >> time and again, president obama saying if you like your health care plan, you will keep your health care plan. but a new nbc news report finds just the opposite is true for many americans. lisa, you discovered the white house officials for aware that between 40% to 67% of individuals will not be able to

keep their policies. tell us more. >> first, willie, let me lay the groundwork here. for the 80%, roughly 80% of americans who get their insurance through their employers, the white house is correct. most -- they will be able to keep their insurance. there's very lit until this law that impacts employer plans. the problem comes in the individual market, and that's what we were looking at. we were hearing about people getting cancellation letters or getting letters saying that their current policy did not meet aca standards, and therefore was going to have to be dramatically changed. so in both cases those folks are not able to keep their insurance even if they wanted to. so our team went to try to do a little digging into the universe of this. and i went to the regulations from june of 2010, which dealt with the grandfatherering issue.

when it comes to individual plan, it says because of all the turnover you customarily get in the individual market, that a reasonable range for the percentage of individual policies that would terminate therefore relinquish their grandfather status is 40% to 67%. then on top of that, because the way they have defined what constitutes a current policy in a way that means if your deductible is changed significantly, whatever, then you can't qualify for grandfathering. when you add those two parts together, you get more than 40% to 67% of folks in the individual market cannot keep their policies even if they want to. and the administration knew that. >> gene robinson, how does that square with the president of the united states in the state of the union address, in the state of the union address, where he's selling this package say, "if you like your insurance policy, nobody's going to force you to

leave your plan"? how does he square that? >> well, you can't really square the two. clearly the president should have added this disclaimer that was in the regulations, that's in the law. you know, now, keeping it in perspective, the vast majority, more than 90%, probably, maybe 95% of all americans who have health insurance will, in fact, be able to keep the same health insurance they have. most of them have it through their employer. some of it have it through individual plans. >> the president was adamant in the state of the union address. the president was adamant in the 2012 campaign. the president was adamant. and he would say some people are trying to scare you. he would point to those terrible republicans saying they're lie, they're trying to scare you and tell you some bureaucrat is

going to kick you off of your policy. no, i'm here to assure you as the president of the united states if you like your plan you get to keep your plan. not only is that not true, lisa myers' reporting shows this morning that he knew it wasn't true and went on saying it anyway. >> well, the president was categorical. he should not have been categorical. this was in the regulations. in fact, there was some mention of this during the whole hoo-ha over obama care. it was very briefly and frankly unnoticed by the vast majority of us, talked about on the hill. so this question of the grandfathering was no. we should at some point get to the question of the policy, however, and why this is the case. and it goes to the aims of obama care, which are -- >> if it's such a great policy not to cut you off, then why did the president believe he could tell the american people the

truth? >> are you suggesting perhaps the public relations around the affordable care act and the launch have not been as smooth as they possibly could be? i'm shocked. >> no. what i'm suggesting is i would never on my key landmark piece of legislation tell the american people something that was diametrically opposed to the truth over and over and over and over and over and over and over again over the past five years. go ahead, jane. >> what white house officials say over and over again is in the end the policy is going to work out, and that may well end up being the case, and if it does i think the conversation will be a lot different in a year or so. but it is a real problem when you have on the one hand these tremendous issues with the website, just over the weekend we had a whole other set of problems that hadn't been discovered until now. so you have that component of it, the everyday answer to questions about that. and now they're having to answer questions about whether the president was quite honestly telling the truth to the

american people. those are not things you want to be dealing with at this stage. they would much rather be talking about the policy, talking about rollout numbers. this is not the rollout they imagined. >> really, you line this stuff up, you've got of course the website and then the "l.a. times" article that breaks over the weekend, sticker shock, the working-class americans getting cancellation notices and the sticker shock aspect that mike talked about. that's terrible politically for him and terrible for working-class americans and middle-class americans. now lisa's component, the third component of the story, which is the president, if the report is correct, and i know it is, the president's been telling things to american people that he and his administration know aren't true. it's three bad strike against him. >> let's be careful about saying this is a tiny sliver of people. there are 14 million americans who get their insurance coverage individually. that's not an insignificant number. lisa, the white house yesterday, jay carney at the briefing, effectively said, yes, there are some plans that don't meet the

minimum standards of the affordable care act. that is, in fact, true. they would say, though, that our plan allows you to get more benefits. yes, maybe your premium goes up, your deductible goes up, but you'll have more benefits including for mental health. what did the white house tell you in response to your point? >>. >> they basically made the same point. they said, look, anyone who is losing their insurance is losing their insurance because it doesn't meet our standards. and this new policy will get people more protection, they can't be dropped because they get sick, they by and large are going to have a richer package of benefits. the problem is a lot of if folks we talked to who have received these notices first were shocked that they got them because they thought the president had told them they wouldn't, but also they didn't like the government telling them what they had to buy. and they in some cases were very happy with the more bare-bones policy that they thought met their needs and cost them less. now, there was one individual who actually found another

policy where the premium was lower than what he had, and he thought it was a good plan. but he was still irate that he had received this letter and that he charles hadlock to go shopping for a new plan. >> encourage everybody to read lisa's report. go to nbcnews.com. she and her team put together a lot of reporting on this story. another big headline this morning, not just america's allies upis the over the agency's wiretapping. dianne feinstein is calling for a full review of the mass data collection at home and abroad. the california democrat who chairs the senate intelligence committee says she's totally opposed to tie s&p 500ing on u.s. allies. according to senator feinstein, congress has not been adequately kept in the loop on all this. feinstein also said the administration assured her the surveillance would not continue, a point some officials later challenged. while the president may be poised to order a ban on eavesdropping on friendly leaders, it's still unclear what exactly the white house knew and when. the agency said it did not

inform the monitoring of ang lal merkel. but the "l.a. times" says the white house and state department both signed off on it. >> mike, you're taken back to the days of iran contra. again, i'm not comparing any of these scandals to iran contra or any of these dust-ups to iran contra, but we keep having to ask ourselves the question. is the president really in the dark the way everybody around him claims that he's in the dark about these huge issues? and if he is, is that worse than if he had known about it? day ma milbank wrote this in "the washington post" today. for a smart man, president obama professes to low very little about a great number of things going on in his administration. on sunday night, "the wall street journal" reported he didn't know about until this summer that the nsa had been bugging the phones of angela merkel and other world leaders for five years. that followed a quote by

kathleen sebelius that obama didn't know about the problems in the health care website before the launch. the white house has frequently given a variation on this theme. the question -- what did obama know and when did he know it? answer, not much, and about a minute ago. >> if he didn't know -- >> i mean, i mean, not much and about a minute ago. and so now we're hearing from -- that from other people that he did know for five years that angela merkel and -- i mean, this is -- this is bad. >> well, the length of time that the program has been under operation or at least the length of time it's been published, five year, perhaps longer with various world leader, but if you did not know, if you choose to believe the president of the united states, and i believe the president of the united states, i want to believe the president -- >> some reports suggest they signed off on it, though. >> if he didn't know, why did he not know? and the larger question is do we

have -- do we have an out-of-control national security agency? do we have a secret government in the shadows of government that the president of the united states and elected officials doesn't know about? >> so our feed from the south of france is obviously up. >> yes. >> i just heard groaning. >> yes. >> so, mika, thank you so much for showing up. just pop right in. >> sure. >> and defend the president because god knows he needs somebody defending him this morning given all the things going on. >> okay. come of things. started in the bush administration, so i guess you could ask if president bush knew, too, and put those questions to him as well. >> what started in the bush administration? >> this monitoring of phone calls. >> of foreign leaders? because i haven't seen any evidence of that. >> did you want me to talk? i thought we were amongst friends. >> i want you to educate us. what report suggests that george

w. bush tapped the phones of world leaders? >> when did this start? >> four or five years ago. about the same time -- >> 2002. >> 2002. >> the tapping of foreign leaders? >> yes. and so you have to apply the same questions to president bush, first of all, whether they do or do not know. and i think barnicle brought up the biggest point, and that is, is the nsa overreaching in its power? is this something people want done but they don't want to hear about it? you've got to look at that part of it too because we could apply this to a couple of different issues that we complained about or argued about on our set about the conduct of the bush administration. but i would say that most importantly are the important disconnect that i think is happening in this story is that people are thinking someone is sitting there listening to her conversations. the phone calls are being monitored. that's different than tapping the phone calls. >> if this was gene -- >> gene. am i wrong?

>> i did write about this morning actually. >> oh. i was reading that. >> do we think the nsa is out of control? >> yes. >> some of us do think the nsa is out of control and some of us think -- you know, it's an interesting question, though. we don't know all about what the president knew and when he knew it. but it is certainly outrageous to me that the nsa would think it could, like, tap the phone of -- monitor the phone of the german chancellor without telling anybody. >> and james, since you wrote on this, help me out. is there evidence that george w. bush had the nsa tap the phones of our top allies in germany? our france or -- is there evidence of that? >> reports in my newspaper and in other pups from the reporters who are well sourced in this say that this program of, like, you

know. >> on your friends started in like 2002. >> coming up on "morning joe," we'll check in with politico's jimvandehei. we don't want to. just sort of a contractual thing between us and politico and mike allen wasn't available. and "consumer reports" is out with it new rankings of car safety. which models got a flunking grade. and a new report says some troops are going to extreme measures to pass the military's fat test. how liposuction is becoming the weapon of choice. i like it. mi mika, i want men and women that are defending our nation's honor having to get fat sucked up so they can run up hills and shoot the enemy. >> this is a tease. let's just go to bill karins. i mean, seriously, just toss to him. >> how's the weather, bill? >> straight and narrow. no comment on that last story, huh? okay. today is the one-year

anniversary of hurricane sandy making landfall in new jersey. seaside heights, the boardwalk rebuilt, then the big fire by fun world. you can see even the work continues at this hour at some areas of the jersey shore, some people starting back in their homes. one year later it's still a work in progress. it's because it was such a huge storm. look at a picture of the satellite impaj behind me, this storm was 1,000 mile ls across with tropical storm-force winds. that's unheard of. another thing it did was crazy was turned back towards the coast, making it the worst-case scenario for the jersey shore, the new york city area, most likely a once in a lifetime storm for a lot of people in those areas. today as far as travel goes, we have heavy rain, kansas city all through missouri. missouri by far is the worst travel weather out there. this rain is going to be widespread over the next two day, about 2 inches possible in many spots, including san antonio, dallas to little rock could expect at least a half inch, maybe up to 2 or 3. you'll get a good two days of

rain out of this. east coast, you remain fine, west coast looks okay too. as far as airports go, my biggest concerns are kansas city and st. louis with thunderstorms and heavy rain. i would say it's a safe bet you'll have airport delays. you're watching "morning joe." picture of seaside heights, a year ago right now some of the worst devastation took place on the jersey shore. dad! dad! katy perry is coming to town. can we get tickets, pleeeeease??? tickets? hmm, sure. how many? well, there's hannah, maddie, jen, sara m., sara b., sa -- whoa, whoa. hold on. (under his breath) here it comes... we can't forget about your older sister! thank you, thank you, thank you! seriously? what? i get 2x the thankyou points on each ticket.

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okay. time now to take a look at the morning papers, shall we? we'll start with our parade of papers. the "san diego union tribune," members of the military are increasingly getting liposuction to lose weight to help pass the body fat test. fitness experts argue that the test isn't accurate and are urging the defense department to change requirements. the number of soldiers discharged for being overweight is ten times higher than it was five years ago. >> willie, what do you think? like if we're in the marines and we e get -- we're probably instead of running like 20 miles, just going to go to the doc, right? >> we're well bast marine condition, i'm afraid, joe, unfortunately. >> but if we wanted to, liposuction instead of running. makes sense to he. "the raleigh news and observer" writes that less than a week after five people were hurt on a ride at a north carolina state fair, there's another accident

involving the same type of ride at the same fair. a worker is in critical condition after the festival's second vortex ride fell on him. xwront let my children go on these rides. three of the five people hurt in the first vortex accident remain in the hospital. one of the victims is just 14 years old. >> oh my god. >> these carnivals are just set up and go from town to town. do you let your kids get on those rides? like i'll let them get on the teacups or -- >> no. i went on the teacup at hershey park and i'll never, ever, ever go on a ride -- >> really. what? >> what is a vortex? >> the vortex, it's where it spins out around a -- >> no. why. why. >> why do it. >> we find other things to do like push-ups and -- >> eat kale chips and read shakespeare while other kids are having fun? >> we make them run up hills.

who can get to the top first. yeah. >> kale chips. >> yes. >> eating kale chips. okay. that's great. >> corn maze. we do the corn maze. yeah. all right. "l.a. times." lexus tops consumer reports vehicle reliability rankings this year, but it's not all good news for the japanese automaker. the toyota camry, rav-4, and prius 5 were removed from failing frontal crash tests. this year three non-japanese brands, the audi, volvo, and gmc, were in the top ten. >> the "san francisco chronicle," a mysterious barge housing four stories of shipping containers is floating near treasure island near san francisco. it leaks the structure to google but the tech jinlt has declined comment. experts speculate it could be a floating data center. another possibility is a marketing center for google

glass. either way, that's kind of creepy, willie. >> totally creepy. >> i don't fully understand the story. >> speaking of creepy. >> a big barge in the water and they're making google stuff in there. >> that's the significance between east coast and west coast. you see a floating barge out there you figure it's a tech center. you see something off long island you figure it's just garbage, right? >> often it is. >> often it is. trying to figure out a place to dump it. >> right. >> so speaking of -- >> creepy. >> creepy and garbage and -- >> boy, wow. >> i'd say creepy. >> jim vandehei is here with us. >> aw. how's your son? he's so cute. >> didn't see that coming. my son's fantastic. we don't put him on the teacup either. or let him eat kale. >> did you have dinner with the president and ceo of something? >> i don't know why. >> i think the north virginia rotary club? the elks club? >> something like that.

>> i can feel the power sitting one person away from him, and i'm melting. >> he's the ceo. >> melt away. >> jim, let's talk a little playbook business here. virginia's governor race increasingly appears to be in the hands of the democratic candidate terry mcauliffe. he's opened up a double-digit lead in the latest polling, up on ken cuccinelli, the republican attorney general there, 51% to 39%. robert sarvis polling at 8%. among men, the two candidates statistically deadlocked but there is a big gap among women. mccauliffe leads cuccinelli. i understand the president is going into virginia this weekend. >> if i were the president, that's what i would do. up by 12%, no chance democrats aren't going to win the seat, then i would go in there and be able to help claim part of the victory. mccauliffe is a little nervous and wants turnout from the groups that helped obama in the state. i don't think there's any mystery to the outcome of this

race. i think probably inside the white house, a little worried that the clintons are getting all the attention for spending so much time on this race in the state, building up their political operation, and will they get the credit for the victory, you know, partially, at the end of the day this was probably a superior candidate in an environment that very much favored democrats. >> jim, i'm going to ask you this. from outside virginia, not following the race closely, makes no sense to me that a libertarian candidate would run against ken cuccinelli, whose conservative credentials are about as good as they get. in fact, you know, he who is less than diplomatic in his book taking on social security, medicare, doing a lot of things that, you know, would say, man, that's not really smart if you want to get elected in america, and yet a libertarian is pulling eight points from him. in a libertarian is not in the race, this is actually much closer, isn't it? >> it would be closer. you know, cuccinelli's had baggage from the beginning

starting with the sitting governor who's basically had "the washington post" on him for the last year on scandal coverage that had an effect on this race. >> why have the libertarians filled a candidate against one of the most conservative ps guy that you could find in virginia? >> welcome to the republican party. that's the debate we've been having on capitol hill. in most kalss someone is never conservative enough and there's a difference between the libertarian strain of conservativism right now and the conservative strain of the conservativism right now. you'll see that in 2016 in almost every single race. if you look at the collection of people looking to run in 2016 you'll have an authentic conservative candidate, scott brown, who thinks he might run. he's been forming a pac up in new hampshire. i don't think there's a place for scott brown in the modern republican party, at least outside of new hampshire. so it's an interesting test case

for republicans in virginia, but at the end of the day, this is a big moment for terry mcauliffe, the fact he's been taken seriously. i think those that have known him for many year, he's ban prolific fund-raiser but there's been a gap between people taking him, he's like a serious policy guy, a politician, and a friend of the clintons who can raise a lot of coin. >> politico's jim vandehei, thank you. up next, become plg october. baseball icon reggie jackson opens up about his hall-of-fame career, how the yankees slugger dealt with some nasty treatment inside his own dugout. we'll talk to reggie when "morning joe" comes back. ♪

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the game ended, sffans flood the field, jackson put his glasses in his helmet in his hand and like a comic book superhero transformed himself. he turned from babe ruth into o.j. simpson, daring around people and joined his teammates in locker room. jackson assessed his magnificent performance. is this the best day of your life? >> i've had some good ones.

this one tastes pretty sweet. >> that was a report from the late great dick shaft describing one of the hallowed moments of world series history. reggie jackson hitting three home runs in game six of the 1977 world series against the dodgers. joining us now on set, hall-of-fame baseball player himself reggie jackson out with a new book, "becoming mr. october." boy, reggie, looking at that, pretty good broken-field runner. you could play for usc or any major top ten college and done them credit. you know when i was watching that clip and nearly every time i see you, whether it's on tv or i see you at the ballpark from a distance, i harken back on the longtime season ticket holder at fenway park, boston red sox -- >> i can hear it. >> i can remember sitting in my seats right behind the red sox dugout on a june day in 1977 when the then-manager of the new

york yankees -- >> oh, man, i thought you were going to talk about the home run. >> no. yanked you off the field. i think there were two outs and you played in right field, and i was watching you run in and i could see the steam coming out of your ears. there was an altercation in the dugout with the manager, billy martin. what was it like playing for him? >> well, let me first say that when i was running off the field in 1977 at that time, i had no idea what was going on. so when i went in the dugout, i was miffed and confused and did not know why i was coming out of the game. i had no idea that i was being accused of not hustling on the ball that jim rice had hit. i know that paul blair was running out there and he had a smile on his face. and then just last year fran hailey had told me the story and, you know, i still converse

with so many of the players that mike torres had said to fran healey, billy martin had come to the mound to take him out of the game, and he had said, "watch this." and nobody knew what was going on. and mike i guess figured it out, and thurman did, as well, and mike said, "don't do it." i never really knew when i came off the field, and i never knew until just a year or so ago that that was transspipyring, this k of planned thought. some people had talked that billy had said he was going to do something before the game even started. i mean, so i don't know how that could have been planned, if you will. >> he just wanted to humiliate you, not just teach the lesson to hustle. you wrote this book "becoming mr. october" about 1977 and 1978. i'm also, sorry to say, a bos

tonian. not trying to gang up on you. >> that's okay. >> the bucky dent home run was sort of my first memory. but the memory of immersing myself in the yankees was the bronx burning. did you write this book as a way to clarify your legacy after something like that miniseries which didn't necessarily portray you in the best of light? >>, you know, brian, i guess i don't worry about legacy or i didn't write this book for legacy. i guess my legacy will continue. i can't do too much to alter it, if you will, to, you know, do good things for humanity, except that. at the same time, i did want to write my view of the '77-78. espn had done theoren diggs in the bronx's burning, which i was disappointed with and saddened by. and so i thought one day if i had a chance to write my view of what went on that i would do that. and it wasn't easy because you had to take on a lot of things and do your best to try to be

truthful and not really try to blame anybody for what happened but just explain it as to how i saw it through my eyes. >> you know, in a portion of the book you write about race and the rule obvioole obviously racn your life and within baseball. 30, 35 years ago is not that long a period of time when you measure history. were you shocked when you get to new york that the component of race became as visible as it did? >> you know, mike, brian, when i started baseball, it was '66. in '67 i was in -- playing baseball in alabama, georgia, and north carolina, tennessee. couldn't stay in the hotels. couldn't eat in the same restaurants. and certainly 1964 was the bombing in birmingham. there was no baseball in '65 and

'66. the chief of police, bull connor, stood in front of the baseball stadium with an ax handle and would not let blacks into the ballpark, players or fans. i was on an experiment -- i was an experiment in '67 on a team that played there, the birmingham a's. so certainly race is part of who we are as a nation. for us to pretend that it's not going on, sadly throughout the world, you know, certainly it's still part of who we are. my rendition talks about it, an important part of the same time in society and who we were as a nation. so i didn't really apologize for being a good player. i wasn't uncomfortable in my own skin. i was a proud american and always felt that the rules should apply to everyone that

basically applied to me as they did to everyone else. and so i was on the lookout, if you will, because it was just part of how i was brought up. >> reggie jackson, the man who performed as well as anybody who ever played the game on the biggest stage of all. the book is "becoming mr. october." reggie, thanks very much. >> thanks. see you guys on in the morning. now i get a chance to shake your hand. >> more "morning joe" in a moment. ♪

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welcome back to "morning joe." a live shot at times square. what's going on here? times square. >> people going to work. >> yeah. it's packed. i was looking at the billboards, actually. so anyway so, we have this little section of the show we call "business before the bell." we talk to the kids about what's happening on -- >> i used to dominate this segment. >> it was unbelievable. >> i owned it. >> they talked about the shactman years. the jordan years in chicago, you have to shactman years. right? we're now in the sullivan years. >> i was so good you had to take me out of it. you had to pay me off to not do it anymore. >> unbelievable. markets quiver when brian sullivan comes on. brian, there's a big meeting with the fed getting under way today. what are we going to be looking for? >> first off, let me just correct something for the record. >> here we go. >> is that a pompadour?

>> i don't know what it is. look at joe's hair, for pete's sakes. reggie jackson is my second favorite baseball player of all time right after rod carew. and like carew leaving the twins, jackson smartly left new york to go to my beloved then california angels. so shactman, you are the yankees jackson and i am the angels jackson. we are separate but equal. >> a burial ground of great hitters. ask freddie lin if he's glad he went to -- >> reggie jackson, "i must kill the queen" from "naked gun." that's the only thing i think of him as an angel. >> jackson has one of the greatest corvette collections or at least did for a while in america. >> i didn't know that. that what's happening on wall street? >> we have the federal reserve two-day meeting that begins today, ends tomorrow. some of the drama has been taken out because we thought by now we'd get the bond buying reduction taper. now it's likely for april so people are calling it the

tap-ril. either way the fed meeting today and tomorrow. >> who's calling it that, first of all? and secondly, what kind of a dork would you have to be to think that's funny? tap-ril. i don't even know what it means. >> it's a combination of the term taper and april. >> i know what it is. i'm just asking. i don't think that's funny. >> march didn't work well. didn't sound good on tv. >> how much of a nerd would you have to be to think that's funny, brian? >> probably a wall street economist. >> there you go. the question answers itself i guess. >> nobody with a pompadour, that's for sure. you have that. you have apple -- listen, iphone sales knocking out of the park, joe. however, margins fell. everyone's concerned about what apple's making on everything it sells because they're selling a lot of stuff, very successful rollout. margins are a concern. the big mystery, guys, and this is the mystery that is gripping the nation, what is the giant floating object in san francisco bay? it's a huge glass building on a barge. the speculation is that it's some super secret google either

store or data center, but it is literally gripping san francisco like nothing since the america's cup or rice-a-roni. >> unbelievable. i thought, mika, it was a whole lot of crates of kitty litter coming over from mainland china. i guess maybe it's something a little more complex than that. mika, you spent some time in an apple store this weekend. how did that work out for you? >> not well, actually. >> really. >> i was there for i think a span of eight hours. the jeep yus bar didn't work for me. anyhow, i spent a lot of money and didn't get what i wanted. >> lnot a lot of geniuses at th genius bar? >> no. >> were they telling tap-ril jokes? >> it was the scientific classification bar so i was looking for help with my geneus. >> i miss the shakman years. >> i don't know if these are dennis miller jokes we're

supposed to laugh at, they're funny but we don't know what they mean? >> this is the worst segment ever. >> a men's warehouse commercial on "morning joe" right now. >> sorry. listen, i'll throw you a curveball. the health care stocks based on everything that's going on with healthcare.g healthcare.gov, what are these companies doing? how are they trading? cigna, aetna, et al? >> now you're going to come to me for some real news? >> yes. >> all right. that's the way it is. aetna beat the street this morning by a couple cents. when you look at some of these stories that have come out, guys, you realize one thing. the insurance company lobbyists probably helped write this bill as everybody has talked about, right? this bill could turn out to be very good for them because when you go through the stories, at least those quoted, premiums have gone up. you've got more people that are going to be insure sod the insurance company stocks have all soared since it was enacted a couple years ago. aetna beating the street today. that's going to be the next big story. >> the affordable care act,

which no one uses an acronym arnold here. >> my question is when is the justice department going to take a peek at insurance industry? >> okay. cnbc's brian sullivan. >> can't have that. >> joe. >> you know, mika we'll never get those two minutes back. >> never. >> on your deathbed, on our deathbed, you know? we'll be thinking about this. >> yep. okay. so, joe, i'm just telling you right now, and this is important -- >> yeah. >> you may not come back until the world series is over. be right back. >> thank you. ♪

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in the coming days, joe will be taking part in a series of events to mark the upcoming publication of his brand-new book, "the right path." things kick off on monday, november 11th, at 6:00 p.m. at columbia university's miller theater. he's going to sit down with pulitzer prize-winning author john meacham. you can get free admission by e-mailing us at see joe at nb nbc un idotcom. up next, what if anything did we learn today. my customers can shop around.

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into right. nava's got it and the red sox win game five. >> welcome back to "morning joe." time to talk about what we learned today. mike, we're excited about the sox, but you know what, this is -- we've got a long way to go. this is a great st. louis team, isn't it. >> it is. we don't have that long to go. >> what does that mean? >> i don't want to say it but we don't have that long to go. >> this series is killing me, man. up till 1:00 and up at 4:00. >> yeah. >> this series is killing me. >> with apologies to senator mccaskill, what did i learn

today, grown men can still be a little bit giddy. i think we're a little fwid di about game six. >> i don't know who's giddy. >> you're not? >> i have been like edward r. murrow today with this sort of flat, stern affect. mee kashgs what have you learned today? >> i learned today an extension of what i said before the break, which is you are grounded. >> what do you mean? >> you may not be back on the show until the series is over. >> why? >> unless larry lets us do the show at fenway on thursday morning. >> okay. are you suggesting that my exhaustion might be making me a little punch drunk? >> i think punch drunk is just -- such an understatement it's not even funny. you're nonsensical. >> i don't even know what you're talking about. michael, what did you learn? >> i learned from our friend manes thshgs, the whole apocryphal party. a little more bottom to hit, joe.

what do you think? >> i think 18% is low enough for me. >> gene? >> charles krauthammer is the yin and i'm the yang. or maybe the other way. >> you have to put a show together. >> we have this eastern thing going on. >> you do. that's what i think of when i think of you and charles krauthammer, an eastern thing. if it's way too early, mike, what time is it? >> ordinarily it's time for "morning joe." but right now it's time for "the daily rundown" and chuck todd. chuck, take it away. promises, promises. is there a big hole in one of the major message points the president used to win over the public on health care? this morning a new report by nbc news finds millions may be impacted. plus weather one week to go before two states pick new governors or perhaps re-elect an old one, some numbers you should know about who's showing up in the garden statend